$92 Million Dollar Surveillance Fence Coming to the US Border...

Don't worry US taxpayers. It's not our fence, we're just the immigrants.

"There's always a way, eh!"

Canada - A massive intelligence-gathering network of RCMP video cameras, radar, ground sensors, thermal radiation detectors and more will be erected along the U.S.-Canada border in Ontario and Quebec by 2018, the Mounties said Tuesday.

The $92-million surveillance web, formally known as the Border Integrity Technology Enhancement Project, will be concentrated in more than 100 “high-risk” cross-border crime zones spanning 700 kilometres of eastern Canada, said Assistant Commissioner Joe Oliver, the RCMP’s head of technical operations.

The network will be linked to a state-of-the-art “geospatial intelligence and automated dispatch centre” that will, among other things, integrate the surveillance data, issue alerts for high-probability targets, issue “instant imagery” to officers on patrol and produce predictive analysis reports. (more)

Weird World Bugging News...

Wait. What!?!?  An eavesdropping organ transplant scandal, 47 wiretapping cops, carte blanche surveillance in the USA, SRG's self-licking surveillance ice cream cone, and a spy shop morphing into a pot shop! Too weird.

Taiwan - Taipei mayoral candidate Sean Lien (連勝文) said yesterday that his opponent Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) should drop out of the election if police are not able to confirm the existence of the alleged eavesdropping devices that Ko's election team claimed they discovered connected to their office phone; Lien added that Ko is only trying to divert attention away from his recent human organ transaction scandal. (more)

Turkey - Malatya Police Department launched an investigation on Wednesday into 47 police officers, who are allegedly affiliated with the Gülen Movement, for unlawful wiretapping charges. According to initial reports, the investigation encompasses the wiretapping of phone conversations during the past four years. (more)

US - A federal regulatory body is discussing a rule change Nov. 5 that would allow the FBI to conduct electronic surveillance of devices wherever they're located. (more)

UK - Security Research Group shares jumped 17% as the electronic surveillance and property services firm accompanied a significant increase in half-year earnings with a bullish full year outlook. Its Specialist Electronics unit, which sells IED detectors to the military and bugging devices to police forces, recorded an operating profit of £274,000, up from £7,000. The division was helped by a £268,000 deal with Australian homeland security services for its ‘SuperBroom’ handheld detectors (ironically, a bug detector). (more)

NV - Medical marijuana businesses are one step closer to opening up shop in the Silver State... MediFarm is closing in on a deal to buy The Spy Shop building in Midtown. (more)

Smart Televisions Highly Susceptible to Hacking via Radio Transmission

Researchers discover a massive security flaw in smart TV’s that allow hackers to intercept data broadcasts, insert malicious code, and transform the TV into an antenna that infects all other Internet-connected devices in the household. 

Once the television is infected, it seeks out all other devices connected to the router.

The attacks are untraceable as no source IP address or DNS server is ever presented, instead, hackers perform a classic “man-in-the-middle” attack using radio transmissions. The hijacking, which was discovered by Yossef Oren and Angelos Keromytis from the Network Security Lab at Columbia University, can be accomplished with as little as a $250 antenna. (more) (video)

Rabbi Accused of Planting Mikvah SpyCams... Bails Out

Moving trucks are scheduled to show up at the Georgetown home of Rabbi Barry Freundel, according to signs posted in front of his home on O Street, not far from the Kesher Israel synagogue that provided the house for its longtime religious leader.
 
Freundel was arrested October 14 and charged with six counts of voyeurism for allegedly hiding video cameras in the synagogue’s mikvah, a ritual bath, to record women as they undressed and showered before entering. Police officers were seen carting computers and hard drives out of Freundel’s house on the day of the arrest.

Freundel, 62, pleaded not guilty and was released on his own recognizance, while police and prosecutors investigate videos and forensic evidence. (more) (back story)

10 Ways to Spy on Competition (Like They’re Spying On You)

Knowing about your competition has always been important in the world of business. With the Internet, this marketing intelligence has never been easier to find out, but it does take discipline and planning...

Actions

1. Follow them. (how-to details in the main article)
2. Mystery shop.
3. Ask a question.
4. Call with a complaint.

 On-line Help

1. Explore ad monitoring tools.
2. Find their backlinks.
3. Track their website traffic.
4. Find out what customers are saying.
5. Determine their social media presence.
6. Track their technology.
7. Explore web site content changes.

Remember, assume everything is public these days. Whatever spying you are doing on your competitors, they are probably doing the same on you! (more)

Pest Control Tech Arrested for... Planting Bugs

You can't make this stuff up...
IA - Red Oak Police say 38-year-old Aaron Theodore Johnson was arrested Monday for electronic and/or mechanical eavesdropping, a serious misdemeanor, and felon in possession of a firearm, a class D felony. Johnson is charged in connection with an investigation that began at around 11:10 Monday morning, when police received a complaint from 29-year-old Jessica Hale - regarding a recording device found in her residence...

Upon further investigation, authorities later found a second device in the residence's bedroom. The victim told police that the only person granted access to her residence was a pest control technician. Later in the day, a search warrant was obtained for Johnson's residence in the 2700 block of State Highway 48--which is also the location of RMPKA Pest Control Services. (more) (video report)

Happy Feet: Espionage can look adorable, too.

Just look at a remote-controlled robot disguised as a penguin that interacts with Emperor penguins in Antarctica.

Scientists are using the fake baby penguin on four wheels to get closer to the colony and collect health and population research...



The international team tested the rover, with the chick and without it, and reported in the journal Nature Methods Sunday that both versions caused less anxiety than humans... (more) (dance-a-long)

Get ready for a 'Mystery Science Theater' streaming marathon

Football schmootball. Instead of watching NFL teams throw the pigskin around this Thanksgiving, why not watch a "Mystery Science Theater 3000" marathon with new intros by the series creator? (more)

The Official Spybuster sticker is back!

Our beautiful, 4 inch, heavy vinyl Official Spybuster sticker is back! This was a limited edition give-a-way to our clients in 2011. Use it to let everyone know you support privacy.

4 inch, heavy vinyl

The printing experts at Stickermule now have it for sale in their Marketplace.

If spying by the NSA, FBI, CIA, TSA, GCHQ, MI5, MI6, other government spies, your significant other, or your parents concerns you, sticker it to them. 

If you are in Homeland Security, the NSA, FBI, CIA, GCHQ, MI5, MI6 – protecting us against spies (thank you) – sticker it to them. 

Either way, proudly declare, "I'm mad as Hell, and I am not going to take it anymore!"

Looks great on a white coffee cup.

China Folk Counterespionage Manual

“On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog.” Or an American spy. Or a “hostile foreign force.” So says the “China Folk Counterespionage Manual,” a “how to spot a spy” guide circulating on the Internet. 

Click to enlarge.

The manual, whose origin is murky, first emerged several years ago and has recently enjoyed a renaissance in popularity on social media sites. It offers Chinese citizens tips on how to detect spies in their midst. It was even cited in Global Times, a state newspaper, in late August following the detention of Kevin and Julia Garratt, a Canadian couple who ran a cafe in Dandong, on the North Korean border, on suspicion of stealing military secrets. In an infographic, the newspaper described them as examples of possible foreign spies masquerading as “ordinary citizens.”

The manual might be something more suited for a James Bond movie if it weren’t for the government’s own new emphasis on rooting out “foreign spies,” demonstrated on Saturday when President Xi Jinping signed an updated national security law, named the Counterespionage Law. (more)

China Passes a Counterespionage Law

China passed a counterespionage law on Saturday aimed at tightening state security and helping build a “comprehensive’’ national security system, state media reported.

The law will allow authorities to seal or seize any property linked to activities deemed harmful to the country, the Xinhua news agency said.

Authorities can also ask organizations or individuals to stop or modify any behavior regarded as damaging to China’s interests, Xinhua said. Refusal to comply would allow enforcement agencies to confiscate properties.

Possession of espionage equipment, as defined by the state security department, had also been made illegal, Xinhua said. The news agency gave no further details. (more) (more)

This Week in Strange Espionage, Wiretapping and Eavesdropping Cases

ESPIONAGE
FL - In a dispute over a hotel in Palm Beach, Florida, the inn’s majority owner filed a state court suit accusing its ex-manager of taking trade secrets including client lists, business records and financial data, The Palm Beach Daily News reported... The ex-manager, who owns a 1 percent interest in the hotel, allegedly entered the property Oct. 20 and is occupying the premises without permission, according to the newspaper. (more)

WIRETAPPING*
MI - A Ford City man facing felony wiretapping charges for recording a parking dispute outside his home said Tuesday after a second preliminary hearing was postponed that the ordeal is taking its toll on him and his family. (more) (* in the legal sense)
 
EAVESDROPPING
IN - An Indiana judge has shot down a bid by a man with Chicago ties to have criminal charges against him dropped because prosecutors allegedly eavesdropped on a private conversation he had with his attorneys. (John B. Larkin) agreed to a recorded interview with police at the LaPorte County jail... At one point, the authorities took a break and left Larkin in the room with his two defense attorneys, shutting the door behind them. But unknown to Larkin and his lawyers, the recording continued...  
Similar allegations were leveled at LaPorte County prosecutors in a separate murder case earlier this year. (more)

FutureWatch: A Cell Phone Pocket Drone

For the first time a pocket size drone design for consumer and able to travel with user 24/7 where ever, whenever. All your need is your smart phone. (more) 

FutureWatch: Mindreading - Talking to yourself used to be a strictly private pastime...

That's no longer the case – researchers have eavesdropped on our internal monologue for the first time. The achievement is a step towards helping people who cannot physically speak communicate with the outside world.

"If you're reading text in a newspaper or a book, you hear a voice in your own head," says Brian Pasley at the University of California, Berkeley. "We're trying to decode the brain activity related to that voice to create a medical prosthesis that can allow someone who is paralyzed, or locked in, to speak."

When you hear someone speak, sound waves activate sensory neurons in your inner ear. These neurons pass information to areas of the brain where different aspects of the sound are extracted and interpreted as words.

In a previous study, Pasley and his colleagues recorded brain activity in people who already had electrodes implanted in their brain to treat epilepsy, while they listened to speech. The team found that certain neurons in the brain's temporal lobe were only active in response to certain aspects of sound, such as a specific frequency. One set of neurons might only react to sound waves that had a frequency of 1000 hertz, for example, while another set only cares about those at 2000 hertz. Armed with this knowledge, the team built an algorithm that could decode the words heard based on neural activity alone (PLoS Biology, doi.org/fzv269). (more)

Texas Oil - Target of Business Espionage

TX - “...look at the Eagle Ford Shale and the billions of dollars that's bringing into the Texas economy, the bad guys see that,” said FBI San Antonio Special Agent in Charge Christopher Combs...

Christopher Combs nailed it in this interview.

...they are also looking to snatch company secrets. "It's corporate espionage, there’s no question about it," said Combs. “Foreign governments or foreign companies are looking for any competitive advantage. Whether it's the widget that you use to drill, or it's a process that you use to track inventory better. They're really looking at the company as a whole to find out every little thing that you do that makes you a better company on the world market."...

“We also worry about foreign governments placing people in companies where they really want to find out the secrets," said Combs. ... "They'll take an individual and maybe spend years to work that individual into a particular position in the company, so that they can gather those secrets and bring them overseas," Combs said. Combs also warned about disgruntled U.S. employees who want to take revenge on their companies. "It's not just the threats coming in from the outside, but what information is going from the inside out," he said. 

It's a warning to companies, no matter the industry, to keep an eye out. “It has to be a holistic perspective where you are looking at the people who work in your corporation, your internet and security, and how you conduct business, whether it's here in the country or overseas,” said Combs. (more)